Jon Todd

Tom Hazel, Jon Harris, and I spontaneously decided to hike Katahdin this past weekend. Made the 2.5 hour trek up to Tom’s place then the 2 hour drive to Brunswick and finished with another 3.5 hours in the car for a grand total of 8 hours of travel time. We of couse stopped at Dysart’s, the popular trucker’s eatery to stuff ourselves with food before what would be an epic adventure the next day.

After getting off exit 244 we passed by numerous campgrounds and motels including the one with the strip joint attached to the motel. While Harris found this to be the greatest thing on the planet, I think Tom and I both agreed that both A. a place like that in rural Maine is beyond sketchy and B. where are the naked men… I mean um, I like football.

Upon arriving at our room we set our alarms to get about 4 hours of sleep and dealt with the two bed three person situation the only way we knew how, Hot steamy tight man spooning. Tom was his usual inner spoon with one arm back to keep me awake in the event I should try to fall asleep.

We got up at 4:15am ate and arrived at the park at 5:30am, 30 minutes after the gate opens. While driving down the access road we suddenly realized that we would have to join the 100 or so other cars that had so diligently arrived before us. This is obsurd! Since the park has a very limited number of spots to park we new our chances were not looking so good for getting into the park let alone actually hiking Katahdin. To make matters worse, since the line moved so infrequently Tom turned the car off only to find that it wouldn’t turn over when we actually had to move again. As the gap grew larger and larger between us and the cars in front of us, irritated yuppies in there SUV’s decided to slide around us and take our spot.

Luckily some Bowdoin friends were eight cars back and they gave us the jump we needed. After waiting for about 2.5 hours we finally got to the gate where they had just put up a sign that said that there were no more parking spots left for Katahdin, you know why, cause we got the last one! That’s right biotches. After all that we got the last parking space at Katahdin Spings Campground.

While this didn’t allow us to take our originally planned itinerary, it allowed us to perform a back side attack which was quite enjoyable, Tom says he really enjoys the back side attack.

We made quick work getting in and up the back side leaving our friendly Bowdoin acquaintances, some thru hikers, and some sterile mules in the dust. In fact after passing the sterile mules I proceeded to chant Colby……HIGH SCHOOL! I think that went over well, it was all in good fun. Tom being the sensitive one in the group thought such a comment would be a bit harsh so he was promptly flogged for his inncolent behavior.

Right, so there we stood at the summit. Not a cloud in the sky, a beautiful sunny day but something was just not right. There were like 40 billion other people at the summit, and in particular there was one face which looked vaguely familiar behind her dark sunglasses (polarized obviously). Is it Karen? I dunno. Then there were like 5 of those awkward moments where you look at the other person and they look at you and neither of you actually know if you know each other. So when one of the women in the group needed a photographer I hopped on the opportunity to make conversation. Sure enough it was my friend Craig’s cousin Karen. Rock solid.

Mildly exhausted and thuroughly famished we wipped out the roni log and went to town on it with some cheese, tuna, peanut butter, and hippie pitas. Thinking back on it, they tasted like garbage but at the time it was delicious.

This being Tom and Jon’s Katahdin 1.0, they wanted to be able to say they hiked the knife’s edge so we hobbled out onto it for a few minutes, realized if we went any further it would be dark before we got back, and decided to hike back down the way we came up.

Hiking downhill changes my mood drastically. On the way up I’m the happiest person in the world. Every step means I’m closer to the top and every view get’s better and better. The way down just sucks. Knees hurt, views get worse, no more goal, so this is when I go into “Zen no more talking jon” mode. Despite my hatred for going down the back side, I centerd my chi and became at peace with my surroundings ( the back side).

Before long we reached the cars and Katahdin 2.0 came to a close. We drove 5 miles deeper into the park to our campsite at Nesowedahunk Campground (hunk for short). I started the fire, Jon pitched the tent, and Tom cooked a delectible feast of macaroni and cheese. Glorious.

The next day we drove back home.

The End.

Picture to come soon!